WoW – More fun together!

How to tank every (almost) cata raid boss

We have some folks tanking our raid this week that don’t normally tank. So I decided to post the short short version of how to tank 9 of 12 cata raid bosses. This is VERY simplified and aimed at poeple that already know the fights as a DPS or healer and just need to know the tanky bits. Enjoy!

Magmaw

Get in range fast. Don’t ranged pull and then run in slow.

Try to not use big cooldowns when you get omnomnomed (mangle) but if you have to, use them.

When he comes up off the spike be sure you are in your tanking position and that you do some serious threat as fast as you can.

Use something to stay alive for the first 30 seconds after he comes up off the spike. That is the worst time for heals.

That is all. He is easy.

Omnomnomistron Defense

Pick up bosses fast on that first cycle. This is CRITICAL. Keep your camera on the next boss near wakeup time and have your taunt ready.

Don’t stand near bosses that are about to wake up unless you plan to pick them up fast

Know which boss is your turn and which is your partner’s

Tank your boss a 1/3 or ½ way across the room from your partner. If you are too close adds or fire beams can kill you or the other tank.

Be ready to click off your auto attack and stop hitting the bosses for 10 seconds when their shield is up. The shield last 10 seconds. When it goes down, start up your rotation again.

-Fire guy

Keep him slightly to one side of the room. Think about where people are going to run from the laser thingy.

-Poison guy

Move out of the poison cloud FAST. Leave the boss in the cloud if you can.

Put him against a wall, or in a good spot and KEEP HIM there. Don’t move around. The kiters need a consistent spawn point for the adds.

Stun one add yourself if you can.

-Lightening guy.

Don’t move around a lot. People need to stay spread so just pick a spot and let them move around you.

-Arcane guy

Move him out of puddles fast.

Interrupt as much as you can.

Dont forget to still interrupt while he shield is up.

Maloriak

-Boss tank

Know who is doing what interrupts. If you are doing some do them right. If you are having trouble with them try to swap the plan around so you can do the storms. Infact, unless you really have a handle on the add thing, just do the storms.

Make sure you don’t accidently hit an add pack instead of a storm.

Hold the boss right where he starts. Use the first few seconds of the fight to line him up. Remember he runs back to the pot when he throws a vial. Don’t follow, just wait in your lined up spot.

If you get the first mark on your head don’t move, but pop some big cooldown to stay alive.

When you go to the back for the green phase, remember the boss will hit hard and there will be an arcane storm to interrupt. Move back to the proper boss spot as soon as you can while still interrupting all arcane storms. Missing one now will wipe the raid.

-Add tank

Pick up adds fast. Get plenty of threat and debuffs on them as soon as they come out. By the time you are at 3 packs you are going to be getting pounded. If the fire is coming when you have 3 packs, don’t stand in it.

Get the adds to the bottom of the steps FAST when it is green vial time.

If you get 3 packs in the second cycle they hit harder than the first time. Big time ouchy.

Get max threat on BOTH huge adds as FAST as you can when they come.

Chimeron

-boss tank

Find your spot before the fight starts and STAY THERE (until the last phase).

Watch for the ‘double attack’ DBM announcement. When you see it don’t do anything, but start watching CLOSE for a big green/yellow vertical arc the boss does toward the other tank (or watch for the other tank’s health to dip). When you see it, taunt. If you don’t see it, but the boss is instead casting massacre, taunt anyway. The other tank usually picks the boss off you before the massacre starts and the boss should be back on you after it goes off.

When it is stack up time you don’t have to be doing much threat or being in tank mode at all. You can throw heals or whatever you want to keep people alive.

Be sure to be back in tank mode doing good threat as the stack-up phase (feud) ends.

In the final phase live as long as you can while dragging the boss to the back left corner.

-Off tank

Watch for the double attack announcement. When it goes off, taunt right away and then do your best threat for a few seconds.

After a double attack, remember to let the other tank have the boss back. Slow your threat if you have to.

Don’t forget to stack up!

If the double attack is really a massacre (DBM announces a nonexistent double attack before massacre) let the main tank have the boss back.

As you go into the final phase, run to the far right hand end of the room and try to live as long as you can.

Bind dragon (1 tank)

Tank the boss in the center of the room or wherever the raid leader says.

Tank him at max melee

Dodge the rings as good as you possibly can but try not to back up. Just move side to side

If the flame breath targets you or is headed your way, move! It might LOOK like it is going to go behind you but it still gives you sound.

Stay moving in the air phase but be ready to pick up the dragon when he lands.

In the later phases, just position the boss as best you can WITHOUT moving through any walls of fire. If people whine that he is in a bad spot mostly ignore them. Just do your best with the room you have to maneuver.

Watch your stacks and clear them if you have that dragon. The stacks go to 20. Don’t let them get over 14 before you clear them. Don’t let them get over 9 without using some cooldowns.

Try to pay attention to where the other tank is if you are going to have to tank swap.

If you have the interrupts dragon be sure to spam your interrupts as you come out of the 3rd stun when he does the triple stuns.

-Off tank

Pick up the dragon as fast as you can.

Kill it while doing maximum threat.

They hit hard so use cooldowns if you need them

Be ready to pick up the second dragon fast when the first dies.

Twin dragons

Keep the purple one in a stable spot without plenty of space all around it for people to spread out.

Dodge the fire spray on the purple dragon.

When the dazzling swirls appear on the ground dodge them while running toward the center of the room. Run fast. Turn your back on the dragon. Use cooldowns.

Pick up the blue in the center of the room and do good threat even before he feet hit the ground.

Keep him in the center and faced away from the ranged group.

Don’t move around much and if you do, tell the melee in vent that you are moving.

When the fire strips come, remember you can move away from them without moving the dragon. If it comes in the middle just face him to one side or the other and you will be save. If it goes down on a side then just face him toward the stairs on either side.

If a void zone appears just shift to the side.

This fight is ALL about using the ‘Q’ and ‘E’ keys to side step and rotate the dragon.

After the 3 flame strip be ready for the purple dragon to land

Tank her in the center.

Elemental council of jerks

You know… I don’t feel like explaining this one right now. Let’s just leave this at 8 of 12. :P

Like this:

LikeLoading...

Related

28 Responses

Let’s see, stun adds. Nope … someone remind me to ditch my dps offspec and pick up Desecration +2 again before the raid. I’ll need it for a couple of these fights. At least then I can slow them as soon as they spawn (assuming I’m on Tox) and can keep Maloriak’s adds slowed as well.

Halfus we have, Slate, Storm, and Time. I tanked this on Tuesday Hordeside. May need Cyla to stick on Halfus and help with the interrupts, but as long as we burn the drakes fast and swap once after the Storm Rider is down … actually, we’ll have two paladins. We won’t necessarily *have* to swap since we have two bubbles/HoPs.

I’m pretty confident I can do twins, now that I’ve seen the fight a few more times, and especially after seeing it from melee.

Council is easy enough, but if we even get that far … I’ll be shocked. :P

I think we’re set for dps this week, or at least tonight … as far as I know. That being said, it’s been set going into Friday almost every week, and several times we’ve been left scrambling for a dps. I’d say just be ready to plug in that transfer order at any moment. You got a name all picked out I hope? :D

tanking heroics? *shudder* I leave that to the experts. Go ahead and call me chicken, but I’ll take that 40 min dps queue over tanking dungeons any day. I’m sure I could do it, I’ve seen them all enough times that I get annoyed at tanks that don’t mark/use CC when they should be, and I KNOW that I can do it better.

Sorak is probably gonna make me start tanking some, now that my gear isn’t as crappy as it was before. Except .. those guys won’t LET me use CC. I think I’ll just keep leveling my healer. :p

Tanking heroics… Hmmm… Let me think… No! Not going to happen! There’s simply too much for my limited brain to remember. I’m okay with off-tanking raids every now and then, especially with a good leader/caller, but as Repgrind said, i’ll leave heroics to the professionals.

As he is the one boss I have tanked most over the last weeks (screw you, corruption failbobs), I am going to add a tanking how-to for Cho’gall.
– You are taking turns with your tanking partner: One is tanking the boss on the assigned position, most likely in the middle of the room, while the other waits for his Corrupted Adherent to spawn in one of the portal shaped constructions on the sides of the room – the first comes from the left when lookíng from the entrance, the others alternate.
– The Adherent has to be brought to your puddle position (in most cases this will be the entrance) while getting interrupted and dps’d down on the way there. Depending on your group composition, it can be more beneficial to arrange the puddles in a straight line or to fit them Into the corners between the previous to get them at maximum distance. Some “dancing” can force them to place their backsides within the old puddle, but be careful not to put them into the door, as they will be out of line of sight there.
– Shortly before the Adherent spawns and around the time it dies, Cho’gall casts Fury, increasing damage taken via two debuffs by 25% per stack. Get ready to taunt when your partner gets his second stacks at 20 to 15 seconds left on the debuff, so that he can let it drop and tank the next Adherent. Note that you will still have two stacks of Cho’galls Blasts when the Adherent spawns, so let hunters and rogues do their magic.
– A few seconds after Cho’gall summons the Adherent and before you arrive to taunt him, he will mind control several players (two in 10-man and four in 25-man), causing them to cast Twisted Devotion on him for a stacking damage buff. Anything that interrupts this cast will stop the mind control. Your raid has to deal with this together, but for you as tanks it is additionally important to use cooldowns if he gets high stacks of the buff – and stay in your version of defensive stance and on the boss as long as possible to avoid getting mind controlled. Additionally, avoid longer stuns and silences as they can kill a tank when used on a healer or cause someone to eat heavy aoe effects.
– Cho’gall regularly gains Flaming Destruction or Empowered Shadows. This will cause him to deal additional fire damage with melee attacks or trigger three shadow novas. Use personal cooldowns for fire (Mirror of Broken Images is great for this) and divine guardian for shadow, especially when combined with Twisted Devotion.
– 30 seconds after an Adherent spawns, five small blobs called Blood of the Old God will come from each puddle and run towards your raid. They are immune to taunts and generate Corrupted Blood with their melee hits, so only help out on them if things get hairy, and rather with stuns and snares than with threat.
– At 25% of his health, Cho’gall switches phases. He still uses Fury of Cho’gall, but apart from that you only have to keep the Darkened Creations from casting and kill them before the new set spawns – and ultimately get the boss to zero before the whole raid gets fully corrupted.

I’ll be spending all evening tanking this tomorrow. I’m confused though on when the tank switches take place. We were having the tanks swap every time he casts Fury. At least, I think that’s what we were doing. It was two weeks ago that we were last there, so … I’ll be doing some studying before tomorrow night for sure.

As i’ve said (see point three), we’re switching after every Adherent death, which lines up nearly perfect with the second Fury. This means we have the current boss tank at zero or one stack and the Adherent tank at zero stacks. Additionally, one of the Fury casts happens while an Adherent is active, so swapping with one stack can get chaotic. But I actually have to think that through…